Free Web NovelChapter 53: The Workshop
Eight hours in a car with Draven driving and Thorne in the back seat not talking and Morgana reading through ancient texts on her tablet turned out to be exactly as awkward as I’d expected, which was very, and also I’d developed a new appreciation for how much the bonds helped when I couldn’t actually see Kael and Riven.
The stretch was uncomfortable—not painful, just this constant awareness that they were far away and getting farther—and my brain kept trying to reach for them through the connection like checking they were still there.
"They’re fine." Draven’s voice cut through my spiral. "I can feel you pulling on the bonds from here."
Right. Because privacy was dead and everyone could feel my anxiety through supernatural connections.
"Sorry." I pulled my hand away from my finger where my thumbnail had been notching without permission. "I just—"
"Miss them." He finished for me. "I know. The bonds weren’t meant to stretch this far. It’s uncomfortable."
Uncomfortable was one word for it. My chest had this hollow feeling that had nothing to do with physical emptiness and everything to do with being separated from two of my mates, and okay so apparently I’d gotten really codependent really fast which was concerning but also we’d almost died multiple times so maybe codependency was justified.
"We’re close." Morgana looked up from her tablet. "Millbrook is ten minutes ahead."
Ten minutes until we saw the anchor stone that might free Draven from his bargain with Lysander or might corrupt him into something we’d have to kill.
No pressure.
The witch enclave was smaller than I’d expected—maybe fifteen buildings arranged around a central courtyard, all of them radiating that particular magical signature that made my hybrid senses prickle.
A woman in her sixties met us at the entrance, her eyes going sharp when she saw me. "The Hybrid Queen. We’ve heard stories."
Stories. Great. Probably about how I’d barely survived two demon battles and gotten eighty-one people killed.
"I’m Selene." I offered my hand. "We’re here about Cassia—Catherine Thorn’s workshop."
"Ah." Her expression shifted into something I couldn’t read. "The one who left the anchor. Follow me."
She led us through the courtyard to a building at the back that looked older than the others, more weathered, and the wards around it made my teeth ache even from twenty feet away.
"She sealed it before she left." The woman—I should probably ask her name but my brain had apparently decided social niceties were optional. "Said anyone with her bloodline could enter. Everyone else would die trying."
Everyone else would die. Fantastic. Very reassuring.
Draven stepped forward and the wards flared bright enough I had to look away, but when I looked back he was through them and standing in the doorway gesturing for us to follow. ƒrēewebnoѵёl.cσm
"Bloodline works." His voice was tight. Controlled. "Come on."
I followed because standing outside seemed pointless, and when I crossed the ward line it felt like walking through cold water that wanted to reject me but couldn’t quite figure out how.
The workshop was exactly what you’d expect from a three-hundred-year-old witch who’d summoned a demon—ritual circles drawn on every surface, dried herbs hanging from rafters, books stacked in precarious towers that probably violated some fire code.
And in the center, on a pedestal that looked like it was made from bone—which was deeply unsettling—sat the anchor stone.
It was smaller in person than the photos had made it look, maybe the size of an apple instead of a fist, and it was so black it seemed to absorb light instead of reflecting it.
"Don’t touch it yet." Morgana moved closer with instruments I didn’t recognize. "Let me analyze the wards first."
She spent twenty minutes doing things with crystals and chanting in languages I didn’t understand while I just stood there trying not to focus on how the stone was giving me a headache just from looking at it.
"The wards are—" Morgana stopped. Started again. "They’re keyed to Draven’s bloodline but also to intent. If he touches it planning to destroy the binding, it’ll allow it. If he touches it for any other reason, it’ll kill him."
Intent-based wards. Right. Because reading minds wasn’t complicated enough, we needed magic that could judge motivation.
"How do I prove intent?" Draven’s voice was steady but I felt his concern through the bond.
"You can’t lie to it." Morgana set her instruments down. "The ward reads your core motivation. If you touch that stone planning to break the binding to save yourself, it’ll kill you. If you touch it planning to break the binding to save everyone else—" She paused. "It might work."
Might work. Not will work. Might.
"What if his motivation is both?" Because saving himself and saving everyone else weren’t mutually exclusive and humans—or hybrids or vampires or whatever—rarely had single pure motivations.
"Then it comes down to which motivation is stronger." Morgana’s voice was grim. "The wards will measure intent and judge accordingly."
Judge accordingly. Great. So we were putting Draven’s life in the hands of magical object that would read his mind and decide if he was worthy.
Love that plan. Very sustainable.
"I’ll do it." Draven stepped toward the pedestal. "Now. Before I overthink it."
"Wait—" I grabbed his arm. "What if you’re not—I mean, what if the ward decides wrong? What if—"
"Then it kills me." Simple. Direct. Brutally honest. "But we’re out of options and time. Either this works or it doesn’t."
Through the bond I felt his resignation mixing with determination mixing with fear he was trying very hard to hide, and my chest cracked open because this was my fault, all of it, if I’d been stronger faster better none of this would be necessary.
"Don’t." His hand cupped my face. "I can feel you spiraling through the bond. This isn’t your fault."
"It is though." My voice cracked. "If I’d killed the demon the first time—"
"Then we wouldn’t have learned about the summoner. Wouldn’t have found the anchor. Wouldn’t have a way to actually end this." He pulled me closer. "Everything that’s happened brought us here. To this moment. Trust it."
Trust it. Right. Trust that a magical ward designed to kill people would judge Draven’s intent correctly and let him break a three-hundred-year-old binding.
No problem. I was great at trust. Totally my strong suit.
He kissed me—hard and desperate and tasting like goodbye just in case—and then he was stepping back and reaching for the anchor stone and my brain was screaming don’t don’t don’t but I couldn’t make words come out.
His fingers touched the stone.
The wards flared so bright I had to close my eyes, and through the bond I felt—
Pain. Sharp and immediate and wrong in ways that meant something had gone catastrophically wrong.
When I opened my eyes Draven was on his knees and the stone was glowing and his veins were turning black under his skin.
"Draven!" I was moving before my brain caught up, but Thorne’s arm caught me before I could get close.
"Don’t." His voice was rough. "The ward is still active. You’ll die."
"He’s dying right now!" The words tore out of me.
"No." Morgana’s voice was clinical. "He’s being tested. The ward is measuring his intent. If he survives—" She didn’t finish. freeωebnovēl.c૦m
If. If he survived.
Through the bond I felt him fighting, felt his consciousness fragmenting under the ward’s examination, felt him being torn apart by magic that was judging whether he deserved to live.
And I could only stand there and watch.
